Apr 2, 2010

Author: words by Jason Stone / photo by Tracy Kraft

“I got them for super cheap and I thought they would be sick.”­—Jason Stone

It’s funny. Until Tracy Kraft and I started working on the SBC wakeskate article, and we took some photos of my shoe graveyard, I really had no idea how many wakeskate shoes I’d gone through. Lets do a quick rundown of what the deal is. Originally I skated barefoot. I even think SBC ran an image of me boosting an air barefoot. Pretty classic. It makes skating easy to begin with, but shoes make the more advanced moves possible. They offer more grip and when you’re doing flip tricks the last thing you want is to have the board flip over half way and you land on the fins barefoot! My first real pair of skate shoes were given to me by Mauricio. He found a cheap pair of purple Airwalks at a Ross store here on Maui. Those were classics. All puffy, they would soak up tons of water. One session I got slammed really hard and one popped off. By the time I got back upwind to find it, it had sank never to be found again. It was a sad day. My next pair is pictured, the camo vans. I got them for super cheap (seeing a pattern?) and I thought they would be sick. Super thin, not much material. Unfortunately they were so thin that they dug into my ankles and gave me gnarly blisters after a 30 minute session. The next pair was the clown shoes, yellow, white, blue, green and pink. Pro Keds I think. I got these for a steal from the reject bin at Ross. These were one of the best pairs of shoes I skated in. They had good padding in the sole and the material was this plastic like fabric that didn’t absorb water. I rode these shoes until I blew the toes out on one side. Next, I decided to get a pair of shoes that the toes wouldn’t blow out on heavy landings. So I got those sick black and olive green Adidas shoes. Again, these shoes were less that $15. They were good shoes and I had some good sessions in them. They had a rubberized like material over the toes which was awesome because there was no way I could break it. The bummers was that since the shoes weren’t breaking, my toes felt like they were. I had to retire them. Now they’re my backup/loaner shoes. My newest pair is the red, white and blue Pro Keds. They’re the same type of shoe as the clown colored ones. So they have that plastic like fabric that doesn’t soak up water. Pretty classic with the stars on the tops and on the bottom.

Be sure to check out the Wakeskate instructional article by Andre Philip and Jason Stone in the 2010 Buyer's Guide issue of SBC Kiteboard.